I love watching our clearance work when he is on the ball. He is such a pure Rover in the old fashioned sense. He also has a really good first step of acceleration as he handballs and moves to advantage. Seems to have worked hard on his field kicking off both feet as well.

Watched him in the replay very carefully. Has good speed away from the stoppage but often bangs it onto the boot blindly when he has time to have a look. Once he realizes he has a little more time his going to be a real weapon for us.

The few times he did look up he kicked the ball perfectly to advantage.

He was raging hot early, then he vanished, then rejoined the game in the last.

For some strange reason he spent a lot of time on the bench, especially in the 2nd and 3rd 1/4’s. Only 71% game time.

I reckon (and it’s just a guess) they often manage game time for 1 or 2 guys, possibly just to give them a lighter week sometimes.

Resting one or two mids for the majority of third quarters seems to be a deliberate tactic to freshen up the midfield for the final quarter.
They’ve done it a lot this year, and to some extent, last year.
I can even remember Merrett sitting out about 50% of a third quarter in one game.

Seems odd, but hard to argue with given our last quarter midfield surges. Think it’s also a key factor in the team having confidence that they can turn it on in the last.

It’d be interesting to see if we stuck to that in the games where we’re being pummeled in the third.
Can’t remember myself, possibly because those games I’m too busy cursing & drinking.